


past midnight

by purple01_prose



Series: and that's what growing up can do for you [2]
Category: Transformers: Prime, Transformers: Robots in Disguise (2015), Transformers: War for Cybertron
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Aftermath of Violence, Autistic Character, Dark, Drugging, Emotional Manipulation, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Gen, Horror, Kidnapping, Nonconsensual sensory deprivation, Psychological Trauma, Stalking, Strongarm Defense Squad, Torture, nonconsensual drugging
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-30
Updated: 2015-06-30
Packaged: 2018-04-06 22:50:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 16,466
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4239645
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/purple01_prose/pseuds/purple01_prose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A routine patrol takes a turn for the worse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	past midnight

**Author's Note:**

> _Strong_ trigger warning for emotional manipulation, body horror, torture, force-feeding, vomiting, and PTSD elements. Also for nonconsensual drugging and sensory deprivation. If anyone wants to add any more triggers, please let me know in the comments.

“There are two different stories in horror: internal and external. In external horror films, the evil comes from the outside, the other tribe, this thing in the darkness that we don't understand. Internal is the human heart.” _John Carpenter_

* * *

 

She had water sloshing somewhere around the vicinity of her engine, and she was starting to feel cold at the edges of her plating. Her windshield wipers were working furiously (she’d thought they were strange adornments when she’d picked her altmode, but now she understood why they were necessary), and she was relying more on her EM field than her headlights.

 

She was going to tell Bumblebee ( _respectfully_ ) that she would not being scouting in the Cascade Mountains again. There was far too much rain.

 

She still had several hundred miles to go before she got home, and while normally this would have been the time she pulled over to catch some recharge before continuing, the rain and the prickling in her plating were keeping her from doing so. She didn’t recharge well in the rain, and there had been nothing to cluster under for the last thirty-three point two miles.

 

She had been counting.

 

She finally saw a covered garage strewn with decaying pine needles next to an abandoned house. She scanned it for humans anyway, and she hummed slightly when the scan came up negative. She eased under the shelter, and though the ground was still damp, at least the water wasn’t plinking on her plating anymore.

 

She was still cold, however. She transformed carefully—not to dismantle the garage she was clustered under—and reached into her subspace for the survival kit that Bumblebee and Fixit _insisted_ she carry.

 

Once she’d curled up with the thermal blanket and had the cube of energon held in one hand to warm it up, she activated her comm. “Lieutenant? Cadet Strongarm reporting in.”

 

“Strongarm? You okay?”

 

“Situation normal, sir,” she answered, straightening up out of habit. Her chevron clinked against the top of the garage and she made a face before hunching down again. “Just wet, and a little cold.”

 

“You’ve got the thermal blanket?”

 

“Yes, sir,” he really was like a creator with sparklings, she thought. Sometimes it irritated her, sometimes it made her fonder of him, but for now, she was too cold to care. “Just waiting for it to catch up with my core temperature.”

 

“How far out are you?”

 

“Still another day’s drive at least,” she said, tipping the closed energon cube here and there to help it loosen. “More, if this rain doesn’t let up.”

 

“Just drive careful, okay? You’re too vital to the team to get lost because you drove too fast over wet road.”

 

“With all due respect, Lieutenant, that’s better suited to Sideswipe, not me.”

 

“Heh. Fair enough.” He paused, and when he spoke again, his voice was pitched a little lower. “You all right, Strongarm?”

 

She hunched over a little more, her doorwings pressing against the wall of the garage. “Not...enjoying this assignment. Sir.”

 

“Rain or cold or both?”

 

She struggled with her answer, before she finally said, “It’s dark. Even before the sun went down, it was dark. It reminds me a little of the wilds of Cybertron, and...”

 

“I get it.”

 

“You do?”

 

“Let me tell you about the time that we brought home a mystery satellite into our base and it turned out it was a scraplet trap...” She let his voice wash over her as he told the story about the brave humans who had saved him, Ratchet, and Bulkhead, and by the time he was done, she had relaxed enough to go into recharge. “Get some rest, Cadet. We’ll see you when you get back.”

 

“Yes, sir,” she mumbled, offlining her optics and curling up further.

 

\--

 

Something was wrong.

 

She bolted upright, tearing away the thermal blanket and hitting the top of her helm on the garage. Her head rang with it, but she was already pushing her way out of the shelter with her gun in her hand before she fully realized what she was doing.

 

It took her a few more kliks to discover there was nothing visibly wrong to cause her plating to bristle the way it was. There were no lifeforms nearby, not even Earth ones.

 

It took her a bit longer to realize the rain had stopped, and she had woken up at the cessation of sound. She resettled herself and tucked away the gun before bending down to fold up the thermal blanket.

 

There was a small noise at the edge of her awareness, and she froze as she scanned again. Still nothing came up, but she was still tense. _Always trust your instincts_ , she’d been taught from day one.

 

She needed to head home.

 

She transformed after placing the thermal blanket back in her subspace and took off down the still-slick road, her headlights bright and her scanners operating fully. She pinged Bumblebee with a simple ‘ _heading back again’_ and he pinged her back with _‘stay safe’_ (as if she _wouldn’t_ , she wasn’t reckless like _Sideswipe_ ) and ‘ _see you soon_ ’. She sent back an acknowledgement before she settled into the steadiness of driving.

 

Her internal chronometer informed her she had recharged for perhaps three or four Earth hours—it was still struggling to adjust to Earth-based timekeeping instead of Cybertronian—and while she was still tired, some recharge was better than none.

 

The rain came back an hour into her somewhat-frantic drive, and she slowed down a little. Her weight was mostly centered at her hips and lower, but there was no reason to act carelessly.

 

Her alert awakening gradually eased off until she was sleepy again, and she began to look for some more shelter. This time, she found an abandoned barn, and after scanning it for human lifeforms (negative), she rolled into it and set up her perimeter before she flipped out of altmode and clustered against the wall, the thermal blanket over her legs. She had never quite managed to fully relax in altmode enough to sleep, and she usually wrote it off in that her altmode didn’t have built-in weapons, so she was naturally more vulnerable.

 

She even curled her hand around her gun before she fell asleep, just to be sure. There were stories in the archives about Autobots who felt a prickling across their plating, usually before something bad happened.

 

The Autobots who listened to that instinct had a tendency to live through their battles. Jazz was legendary for his instincts.

 

Despite her best intentions, she fell into deeper recharge, and she woke up when sunlight hit her optics. She had not moved during the night, and she couldn’t find her gun.

 

Her gun was missing.

 

She made that observation, and it took her 0.3 seconds to realize that someone had crept upon her in the night and took her gun without her ever knowing about it. Her engine roared in panic, but she straightened and folded the blanket deliberately. It was possible she had relinquished the gun and it had fallen into the folds of the blanket.

 

The gun did not magically appear, and she made sure to breathe out carefully. Do not indulge in panic, contact your lieutenant. She activated her comm., but all she got was a sharp burst of static in her audial. She winced and shook her head; Fixit’s comms. hadn’t failed except for the once—

 

The _once_ —

 

Oh no. Oh, Solus. _No_.

 

She needed to leave. Immediately. She attempted to flip into altmode, but something stopped her. She tried again, but this time she heard the whine of her t-cog attempting to work.

 

An inhibitor field. She was in the middle of an inhibitor field, with no comms. and no weapon. This stunk of a trap; was it a trap for her specifically? Bumblebee had fallen into the habit of sending one or two of them to faint Decepticon beacons, both to gain field experience but also to make sure they all stretched their legs. The junkyard could feel small at times.

 

In fact, the only reason why she had been sent specifically was because she was so close to causing Sideswipe irreparable damage the next time he attempted to play a prank on her. It was pure chance that she was the one chosen for this mission.

 

So...maybe whoever set the trap (though she’d lay shanix on who set it up) didn’t care who they got. The point of the trap accomplished...what? If they were able to steal her gun while she was in recharge, why not take her then? Why not kill her while she wasn’t able to fight back?

 

Whoever they were—and while she suspected the identity of the trap-center, she wouldn’t declare it until she had the evidence to do so—they wanted to make her feel this way. Panicked, maybe a little scared...How would her team respond?

 

Grimlock would get angry and start charging. Sideswipe would get panicky and nervous, and Bumblebee...Bumblebee would lock down his emotions and focus on the problem. When he was in the field, he was the calmest bot she’d ever known.

 

She nodded to herself. Emulate Bumblebee. She locked away the nervousness and the fear and focused on what she could use. Her comm. was out, but she could still access her map. She started to run down her tasks, but then fear wrapped a cold hand around her spark casing. If he was close enough to take her gun, he was close enough to hack her. If she was already in recharge, once he linked up, he could have bypassed her firewalls to keep her there while he tinkered.

 

Did he already have the coordinates for their base?

 

With a shudder, she locked away the map. She needed to get as far from there as possible to get out of the inhibitor field. Once she was out of it, she could change into altmode and drive as fast as her engine would let her go.

 

Besides, she dared to hope, Fixit was compulsive about keeping them in contact when they were out in the field. If she was able to get moving, if she didn’t check in within an hour of dawn, they would know something was wrong.

 

That hope curdled to fear. What if that was the point?

 

She shook her head and folded the blanket away into subspace. The longer she stood there and pondered the possibilities, the more she would fear and allow for him to go after her. She needed to get away from there, as soon as possible.

 

She started walking.

 

The rain had stopped, but she had to stay off the roads. No one questioned a law enforcement vehicle, but they would question her. She followed parallel to the road, hidden by a string of trees, and tried to ignore the mud seeping into her plating. Every half hour, she checked her comm. unit and ability to transform, and each time, she failed.

 

When she had been walking for half a day, she halted. No inhibitor field stretched that large. Somehow, it had to be moving _with_ her.

 

What if he’d planted it on her? She withdrew into a copse of trees and started to run scans over her body to look for foreign tech. Most inhibitor fields were small, something that could be switched on and off. They had fallen out of use during the war, mostly due to the scarcity of materials, but Jazz had gotten information back to Bumblebee.

 

The _Alchemor_ had left Cybertron right after the Council had deemed the Decepticon sigil the new criminal brand, complete with limited access to resources. Yet with the amount of tech within the stasis cells, anybot with any sort of technical knowledge or expertise could easily create inhibitor fields.

 

And she knew of at least one of the Decepticons had that kind of knowledge.

 

Her scans revealed nothing, no foreign matter where it didn’t belong. Once she got home—and she deliberately made herself believe she would get home—she would make sure that Fixit went over her coding. Just to be sure she wasn’t a walking bomb.

 

She quailed a little at the thought, but then she forced herself to keep moving. She didn’t have to make herself a target. As long as she kept moving, it would be that much harder to ease her into a trap.

 

She had to trust that, anyway.

 

She walked until the sun went down, and then she started looking for shelter. Her walking speed was _much_ less than her driving speed, and hunger gnawed her tanks. She had one more cube of energon, but if she wasn’t able to get back into contact with Bumblebee or Fixit, and if she never left the inhibitor field, she needed to make the cube last.

 

There was nothing that she could find except trees, and with some unhappiness—she did _not_ want to be out in the open!—she settled underneath one and muted her signal as much as she could. She cracked the seal of her cube and drank half of it before storing it back in her subspace. The thermal blanket wouldn’t hide her heat signature, but if she didn’t use it as the temperature dropped, then her core temp would get too low for her to be able to act quickly if she needed it.

 

She decided to risk it.

 

Her recharge was fitful and at some point, it started to rain. The gentle patter woke her up, and the damp snuck up underneath the blanket to gather in her joints. Once that happened, there was absolutely no chance of her reaching recharge at all. She grumbled to herself and folded away the blanket. Might as well walk in the hopes of sluicing the water from her joints instead of letting it accumulate until she couldn’t move.

 

Then she really _would_ be in trouble.

 

The air chilled as she continued to walk. Her headlights flashed on, but she quite firmly decided that she hated rain, as the water made her light waver. The forest around the junkyard was drier, and if she had been able to drive, she would have been out of the Pacific Northwest by now.

 

But her walking speed wasn’t nearly as impressive.

 

At this rate, she might not be out of there until tomorrow by midday, and that was _not_ what she wanted. She tested her t-cog again, but it was still a no-go.

 

She wondered if she had done something to it. Maybe it wasn’t an inhibitor field after all, just run-of-the-mill injury or lack of maintenance. She hadn’t engaged in internal maintenance since before they left Cybertron; they just didn’t have the supplies.

 

As for her gun...that was harder to explain, but surely there was a—

 

She halted. What was that noise?

 

The forest was silent, so it should have made it easier to identify, but the more she strained her audial receptors, the less she was able to make out. She tensed instinctively, and when she heard the shiver of noise again, she gauged her timing and swung out her leg in the most vicious kick she could.

 

Her ankle was caught in a tight grip, a grip she knew _very_ well. She snarled at Steeljaw, who merely smiled. “Your moves have yet to change,” he noted.

 

She badly wished for her gun. She wanted to shoot the fragger more than there were words in the languages she knew. “You’ve been stalking me.”

 

“You’ve reacted as well as I expected. I believe some of your other teammates would have lacked your patience.” His grip tightened on her ankle until the metal creaked. Still his face didn’t change, and her plating bristled. The hand on her ankle hinted at some deeper aggression his smile hid. She disliked the juxtaposition. She didn’t know which reaction was the true one.

 

“So you didn’t care which one you trapped.”

 

“Well, I _did_ hope.” He pulled back on her ankle, and her foot still on the ground scraped against the dirt and grass. The way he gripped her made her very much aware of how easily she had been pinned; there was no good way out of this. She was one of the bigger models on Cybertron, so her training had never included how to break a hold by a bot larger than her.

 

She regretted that. As soon as she got out of this, she would be demanding that training from Bee.

 

“What do you want?” she demanded, calculating fast for how to break the hold. There wasn’t a way that would leave her plating intact. She wasn’t quite to the point yet where she would consider that a viable option; she had no good way to _get_ away. “Why was it so important? To manipulate Lieutenant Bumblebee into...what? Using me as leverage for the exchange of the other stasis pods?”

 

“There are easier methods,” he snorted. “You and Bumblebee are the only ones who are even approaching competent.”

 

Keep him talking, Strongarm rationalized. Get him distracted to the point he releases you. His grip was already relaxing, and once it was loose enough, she could tear her ankle out of his grip and use it to kick him in the chassis. “Why do you say that?”

 

“Sideswipe and Grimlock would have panicked and gotten angry. You forced yourself to remain calm.”

 

She set her jaw. Just how close _had_ he been watching her? His smile was broadening with every appearance of delight, and the tips of his claws glanced across the cables that connected to the gears in her ankle. “There was no point in panicking.”

 

“No point,” he echoed. “Really.”

 

She scowled. “What do you _want,_ Steeljaw?!” Too late, after the words burst from her vocalizer, did she realize she was breaking her composure. 24 hours of constant movement and fitful recharge had taken its toll, and his grip tightened to the point of pain.

 

Then she was facedown in the dirt, with his hands on her wrists and his feet on the back of her thighs. She was viscerally aware of how much bigger he was, and she had no room to move. He slipped his claws into the gears of her wrists and scraped the tip of his index fingers hard against the metal. “Make me angry and I swear to you, you will not have working trigger fingers until you get back to Cybertron,” he said softly.

 

She disabled her vocalizer instead of hurling the abuse she wanted to. When she continued to remain silent, he withdrew his claws from her internal cabling and yanked her wrists behind her back. A burst of static came from her as he snapped stasis cuffs ( _where in the name of Cybertron did he get_ those?!) onto her wrists, and her arms abruptly went limp. He got off her and hauled her upright, and she stumbled against him. He stabilized her, his hand curling around her upper arm in a parody of care. “Careful,” he told her. “Wouldn’t want to fall.”

 

She bit back the words, but he thrummed with amusement anyway. He was enjoying this...why was he enjoying this? She forced her processor past the anger and the creeping horror to analyze her situation. _Utilize your training_.

 

Except her training hadn’t quite prepared her for this combination of circumstances.

 

Point 1: He took the time to set up a layered trap for her team—any of her team. Would the trap have worked with two of them, or was there a presumption that Bumblebee would only send one of them?

 

Follow up: if that presumption _was_ in play, that meant that he also understood the team dynamics well enough to know that Sideswipe and Grimlock would not be sent. Grimlock worked better in tandem with a partner, and Sideswipe wasn’t trusted enough to act alone in the field yet. He didn’t have the training.

 

Point 2: He took enjoyment out of catching her. He had the patience to stalk her for well over a day for this exact reason—to catch her at her most vulnerable, to engender the circumstances to _make_ her vulnerable.

 

Why?

 

How did that fit into his previously established patterns of behavior?

 

“It is entertaining to watch your processor whirl away,” he murmured to her. He was dragging her out of the copse of trees, and she was stumbling every third step. He seemed to ensure that. “Tell me, what conclusions have you come to? That this was a trap for you or your superior officer? It was. That I devoted no small amount of time to creating this trap? I did. Have you thought about why?”

 

“Because you enjoy it,” she spat.

 

“And she speaks! Yes, I enjoy it. I took a great deal of trouble to get my record clean prior to being boarded on the _Alchemor_ so that when I inevitably got out, I could begin anew with those who counted and be invisible to those who didn’t.”

 

“What did you do?”

 

“You haven’t figured it out?” He rumbled slightly, and from the way he was standing, his chassis vibrated against her arm. “Then I’ll let it remain a mystery. Hello, Thunderhoof.”

 

Strongarm stiffened as the other mech cleared the trees. He glanced her over dismissively before focusing on Steeljaw. “I didn’t give you that tech to play ‘capture the cadet.’”

 

“She’ll be useful.”

 

“How so? No ‘bot would trade a cadet for access to a groundbridge.”

 

Oh _damn_. Steeljaw’s field sharpened with displeasure. “Autobots are soft. One recording of her screaming and Bumblebee will grant us anything we want.”

 

Thunderhoof snorted. It was an odd sound. “She’ll be a tough one to break. You’d’ve had better luck with the punk.”

 

Steeljaw’s hand clenched around her arm, denting the metal. Strongarm disabled her vocalizer again to bite back the sound of pain. “The emotional connection isn’t there.”

 

Thunderhoof shrugged. “Your funeral. Bit of free advice from me to you: you didn’t work with ‘bots day in day out before you were arrested, but I did. Hurting one of their own makes them angry like nothing else, and Bumblebee worked under Optimus Prime, the big daddy himself. You wanna put yourself in the ground? Be my guest.”

 

“ _Thank_ you, Thunderhoof.” There was a deep growl to Steeljaw’s words, and Strongarm shivered. His claws buried themselves within her cabling, and she stilled when she felt a split. The slow drip of energon began to run down her arm, and she was helpless to stop it. “I appreciate your assistance.”

 

“I’m taking my hands outta this one. Just wanted to let you know.”

 

“Noted and logged.”

 

Thunderhoof canted his head, before he turned on his heel and vanished. Steeljaw shoved her lightly, the anger he’d so carefully controlled during the interaction showing in his rough handling of her. “What? No questions?” he mocked, tweaking the edge of her doorwing.

 

She started, glaring at him over her shoulder. The words she longed to hurl at him battered her vocalizer, but she kept it muted. She would not be making mistakes again. “Ah, the silent treatment.” He’d flipped back into amusement again. Keeping track of his moods was _exhausting_. “How original.”

 

She glared at the trees in front of her. She had no clue where he was taking her, but he nudged her to the left. The trees were thick enough that she couldn’t immediately see past them, but she refused to demean herself to ask. He already had her in a place of vulnerability, and she would not give him more to add to that. “At some point, you’ll unlock your vocalizer,” he said conversationally, “and then we’ll have some fireworks.”

 

She set her shoulders, and her doorwings rose slightly. His presence behind her was oppressive, and his field was rippling with smug pleasure. He trailed his claws up and down her doors, and her doorwings twitched. She attempted to walk a little faster, out of his range, but he tangled his claws in the wiring that connected her doors to her back and tugged. She hissed, pain arcing through her sensornet. “Let me guess, you’re Praxian,” he guessed, not releasing his grip. She halted entirely, and he bumped into her. “Your doors are more sensitive than your teammates.” He leaned over her shoulder, and she glanced at him. She saw his sharpened dentae and looked away. “The chevron’s the biggest giveaway.”

 

 He stroked the knot of wires, and she shivered unconsciously. She didn’t like anyone getting so close to her, and he was tangled up in her wiring. It was far too personal.

 

 _That’s what he wants_.

 

Through the trees, she saw a large abandoned building, not quite a barn but with that general look of architecture. He pushed her closer, and she felt some of the wires in her back split at the pressure. It wasn’t directly linked to her sensornet, but fat energon droplets spattered her back. “The humans have a tendency to abandon structures once they feel it is spiritually unsound,” he observed. “A few nights of utilizing our technology, and they will leave of their own accord. It’s brilliant, actually.”

 

She bit down on her glossa. They had yet to find out what Steeljaw intended for the human population, and that bit of information was not encouraging. He finally released her and walked around her to open the door. She thought about stepping on his tail and kicking him, but scarcely had the thought crossed her mind before he turned with a smirk. “Almost forgot.” He reached into subspace and came up with a remote, and her optics narrowed before he pressed down on the button, and electricity shocked the delicate wiring between her doors. She screamed, the electricity sending her into sensory overload and then offlining her.

 

\--

 

Waking up was unpleasant. Her optics didn’t want to online at first, and she couldn’t summon oral fluid at first. It felt like some of the training back at the Academy, about how to make your body past electroshocks.

 

Her optics onlined in short order, and she bolted upright. Pain raced through her, and she gasped loudly as her doorwings shrieked in agony. She glanced around her wildly, and stared at the chains that were delicately wrapped around her doorwings. The chains were bolted to the wall, and no other part of her body was chained...just her doorwings.

 

“Nice touch, isn’t it?” She scanned the room, and found Steeljaw sitting across the room from her, his yellow optics eerie in the darkness. “The more you struggle, the tighter they become. You struggle too much, it will cut off energon flow to your doorwings. I’ve heard some Praxians go mad without the sensory input. I wonder if you’re one of them.”

 

“You sick freak,” she spat.

 

He tilted his head. “Do go on.”

 

“Bumblebee will never trade the groundbridge for me. He’s a war veteran, he knows how to make hard decisions.” She clapped her mouth closed, her optics widening. She had disabled her vocalizer before she was shocked unconscious; typically functions stayed the way they had been set before being forcibly unconscious as a defense mechanism. She shouldn’t be talking. “What the hell did you do to me?”

 

“Fiddled with your coding to override your commands for your vocalizer,” he shrugged. “Infected you with a virus to talk.”

 

“You did _what?_ ”

 

“You have information I require.” He leaned back against the wall, resting one hand over a cube of energon. “Answer my questions and I’ll let you fuel.” Her optics locked on the cube, and she wondered how long it had it been since she had eaten something. Her internal chronometer was off balance thanks to the electroshock—that and a few other systems had always been more vulnerable to that kind of attack. It had been at least a day.

 

Her fuel pump turned over. Was her team worried by now? Were they searching for her?

 

“I won’t tell you anything,” she decided, tearing her optics away from the softly glowing liquid. “Lieutenant Bumblebee would do the same.”

 

“It is interesting, your loyalty to him.” Steeljaw picked the cube and played with it idly, one fingertip tracing the cap. “Are you certain he feels the same loyalty to you?”

 

“Yes,” she said without hesitation.

 

“Not even a pause. You trust him that deeply.” Steeljaw made a noise deep in his throat. “That must be a change for you.”

 

“Ex-excuse me?”

 

Steeljaw was examining the cube further, the blue glow reflected in his optics. “I’ve fought your team a handful of times and even I can tell how little the rest of your team trusts you. You could barely stop bickering with Sideswipe enough to focus on the fight. And Grimlock... _you_ trust _him_ as far as you can throw him. You were so ready to believe he was a true Decepticon, all because he wore the badge. You like your world ordered, don’t you, Strongarm. You want your world to make sense.” He placed the cube on the ground and she shifted, discomfort gnawing at her. “It’s why you’re so attached to the rulebook. As long as you live by Autobot code, you make sense and the world makes sense. Except that your team _doesn’t_ live by the code, and you have to deal with that. It must make you so...anxious. It’s why you didn’t want to listen to me at first either—you need to know that all wearers of the Decepticon symbol are universally evil, just all as Autobots are universally good.”

 

“I—that’s not true.”

 

“Oh, it’s not?” He picked up the cube and moved to her, stopping right at her pedes. His tail twitched slightly, and he settled into a crouch. “You’re intelligent enough, but you don’t have the ability yet to make your mind understand that the symbols do not mean morality, merely a political affiliation.”

 

“The Decepticons did evil things during the war,” she spat.

 

“As did the Autobots. But the war is over.”

 

“That doesn’t mean the legacy is gone,” she snapped.

 

He laughed, as if she’d given a brilliant answer. “Now you begin to understand! The Autobot war legacies are just as bloody as the Decepticons, and it has been made _more_ than clear that this symbol has been turned into a brand to mark lawbreakers of _any_ kind,” he tapped the sigil on his arm. “Do you see why Decepticons— _true_ Decepticons—would refuse to live under Autobot rule?”

 

“Ask me that question when you didn’t infect me with a virus and chain me up again, and maybe I’ll see your _point_.”

 

“Again. Yes, that’s right. I’d wondered if you had forgotten.”

 

She stiffened, the chains tightening slightly around her door hinges. “ _Forgotten?_ You chained me up and backed me into a corner!”

 

“And yet it is Sideswipe and Bumblebee who are the first to attack me whenever we engage. Sideswipe is angrier about my treatment of Grimlock than you, but Bumblebee...he seems overprotective, and yet I’ve never heard him breathe a word of it.” Steeljaw’s optics lit up in delight. “He doesn’t know, does he?”

 

“No,” she admitted grudgingly, dropping her optics.

 

“He would never let you leave his sight if he knew,” Steeljaw breathed. She flexed her hands—her left hand felt too hot and compressed, and she wondered what was wrong. Had that been where he’d plugged into her port? “You value your ability to move over telling your commanding officer everything. This is relevant to the case you’re running, and yet you kept it back.”

 

Her facial plating heated, and she refused to look up. There was a slight sound of decompression, and the cube of energon was held in front of her face. Her optics latched onto it, but she kept her hands on the ground. She would _not_ take fuel from him. What if it was drugged?

 

“It’s perfectly safe,” he coaxed, wafting it under her nose.

 

“ _No_.”

 

He pouted, and she glared at him. Everything he seemed to be showing her was part of a façade, and she didn’t know what his true reactions were. She didn’t understand why he would be interested in their team dynamics, or the point behind psychoanalyzing her. He was giving information away too, but she didn’t know enough about how to fit it into a bigger piece to know the worth of what he was imparting to her. “I will hold your mouth open and force-feed you if I must,” he told her in a quiet rasp. Her doorwings twitched at the threat, and the chains tightened infinitesimally. “You will not offline within my custody, even if you wish for it.”

 

“I’d like to see you try,” she hissed back, and for a moment, they froze in the tableau of him leaning over her, the cube of energon held in one of his massive hands, and then he shrugged. He went to put down the cube of energon, and in a flash of inspiration, she kicked it over and out of his hand, spilling the contents all over the floor.

 

He didn’t move for a klik, but the air changed, and the next thing she knew, he had a hand around her throat and had pushed her up against the wall. She cried out, both in surprise at the suddenness of the action and pain from her doors, and his hand tightened around her throat. “You do that again,” he said calmly, his claws digging into her throat cables, “and I will make you clean it up with your glossa. Do you understand?”

 

She glared at him, but his optics were perfectly steady and his hands weren’t shaking. The longer she glared, the tighter his grip, until she couldn’t quite breathe. She dropped her optics and made her upper body relax before she mumbled, “Yes. I understand.”

 

He released her. “Good.” He reached into subspace and pulled out another cube, but this time there was no fanfare in him cracking the seal. His free hand settled on her chin and pulled down, and she attempted to shake her head out of his grasp. He merely resettled his grip and said, “It’s clear that I cannot trust you to think of your own life, so I must do it for you.” He lifted the lip of the cube to her mouth and started to pour, and she choked a little before swallowing. He didn’t overwhelm her, but somehow that just made it worse.

 

Once the cube was gone, he put it back in subspace and let her go. He watched her carefully, still in her space, but then he moved back to something a little more comfortable (apart from the chains, _of course_ ). “Why the Elite Guard?”

 

“Why does it matter?” she snarked. There was a spot of energon at the corner of her mouth, and she reached up to wipe it away. Steeljaw’s eyes narrowed, and she froze.

 

“It matters because I asked,” he said, still in that low rasp. “Tell me.”

 

“I’m under no obligation to t-tell you anything,” she replied, her vocalizer catching. Fear had caught up with her, and she still felt the imprint of his hand on her throat. He said he didn’t want her offlined, but that still left a variety of things for a creative mech to try, and he seemed creative.

 

That resonated, and her optics widened. “You did wetworks.”

 

“Still do wetworks,” he said pointedly, “but my emphasis was on retrieval.”

 

Her tanks churned. “For whom?”

 

“Whoever could pay me,” he smirked and ran the tip of one claw down her cheek. “Scared?”

 

“N-no,” she lied.

 

“No matter what Thunderhoof may believe, I am not stupid enough to push an Autobot beyond all reason,” he said dismissively as he pulled back to sit in a crouch again. “You need not fear permanent damage.”

 

She cleared her vocalizer enough to snark, “Oh good, so glad I can trust your _word_.”

 

He laughed once. “Fair enough.” He looked back at her, and just like that, he was serious again. Her fuel pump flipped with anxiety, and she glanced down at her hands. “Answer the question, Strongarm. Why the Elite Guard?”

 

“I wanted to be a good Autobot. The Elite Guard maintains the peace.”

 

“And it has been a hard-won peace,” Steeljaw mused. “Well, I think that’s enough for now.” He rose and headed for the door. “I’ll be back when it’s time for you to refuel,” he called over his shoulder. “We’ll talk more then.” She shivered and curled up against the wall, careful of her doorwings.

 

No, she knew exactly what he was trying to do. That didn’t mean it would stop it from working.

 

\--

 

“Wake up, cadet. Someone wants to make sure you’re all right.”

 

Strongarm onlined and recoiled back from how Steeljaw was hovering over her. There was a screen in one hand, and she blinked when she realized it was Bumblebee. “Lieutenant!”

 

“Strongarm, it’s okay, you’re going to be okay,” Bumblebee told her, his voice soothing, but she disregarded that in favor of more important information.

 

“Lieutenant, Steeljaw captured me near Route—mmph!” Steeljaw placed one of his hands over her mouth and smiled at the screen.

 

“That’s your proof of life,” he said pleasantly. “I’ll contact you in two days for the drop information.” Strongarm’s optics widened. _Two days?_ Bumblebee clearly had the same idea, but before he could answer, Steeljaw turned off the screen and looked at her. “I will grant you clear thinking under fire,” he told her, before he got off her and walked to the exit.

 

“Wait! Two days—why do you need me for two days?”

 

He glanced back at her. “Oh, _I_ don’t need you for two days. But it will make _him_ panic.”

 

He vanished again, and she shook a little. She did not understand him at _all_. The way he swung from emotion to emotion—his grip over her mouth had been tight with anger, but he hadn’t lashed out at her once the screen was off. His field was tightly controlled, even more than hers was, and if he was angry, why hadn’t he lashed out at her? He’d done it before.

 

Maybe...because it wouldn’t have gotten him anything this time.

 

She turned the thought over in her processor in an effort to stop her tanks from seizing with panic. She was going have a hard time keep that energon down if she didn’t distract herself.

 

Take the emotions out of it, she told herself. Just judge the actions. The emotions don’t matter. He confirmed he’d gone to the trouble of setting up a trap for her or Bumblebee. He specialized in retrieval, with an emphasis in wetworks. He kept her conscious long enough to get to his safe house, but rendered her unconscious before she crossed the threshold. For what purpose? What did that accomplish?

 

To keep her from seeing the layout? Or to keep her from fighting him while he chained her up?

 

He used his visible displays of anger to intimidate her—and it worked, she admitted to herself. He frightened her. She could admit that. But other than that, he kept himself almost brutally contained, like he was conditioned to use his emotions as control of his victims.

 

Or to condition her.

 

But two—three days wasn’t enough time to condition her, so she disregarded that thought and accepted that he was using it as another method of manipulation. He wanted access to the groundbridge...did he want to take it?

 

She set her jaw. Steeljaw could _not_ be allowed to control it. At the moment, Steeljaw and his allies could be contained. With a groundbridge, that would be impossible.

 

She would have to stop it with every means at her disposable.

 

\--

 

Strongarm snapped out of her light doze by the creaking of the door. Steeljaw eased inside with two cubes, and she checked her chronometer instinctively. It was still malfunctioning, but she could have sworn it had been only two or three hours since he’d come to her to show Bumblebee proof of life.

 

He was feeding her more than what she typically fueled with, and it made her uneasy. He had an entire crew of Decepticons to keep fueled, why was he wasting fuel on her? Did he have the fuel to spare? Or was he stinting his own crew to feed her?

 

Neither option was appealing.

 

“You make your thought process clear, you know.” He knelt beside her, one claw cracking the lid of a cube. She leaned away from him, and he ignored that for the moment. “Your poor processor can’t keep up with the level of frustration you must have for how little information you’ve been given.”

 

She snorted. “You’ve given me everything I need to know,” she rasped. Her vocalizer felt raw, and he stilled. “You use emotion to manipulate, you’ve done it since I met you. You trust that your emotions and your usage of them will provide the majority of the intimidation you need to do, because you like to keep your hands clean.” She leaned her head against the wall, her optics dim. The constant stress of her doorwing hinges was sapping her energy. “Odd, for someone who specialized in wetworks. You like control—you _crave_ control. You could never have done this with Bumblebee. He’s a war veteran, tortured by Megatron himself. I’m just a cadet. I’m easier to control. This whole thing was set up so that you could have control over someone in pursuit of a larger goal. You have no intentions of returning me to Bumblebee as long as you can use me to exercise the control you can’t use with the rest of your crew. The two day deadline _was_ for you, to give you time to think about how to keep me.” She offlined her optics, her hands spasming on the floor. “You sick freak.”

 

“Well, that’s very interesting.” He wasn’t moving. He should be moving. The last time she threatened his control, he had a hand to her throat and force-fed her.

 

Her shoulders drew up instinctively, and she bit down a hiss. This was going to hurt.

 

Finally he moved, and her optics turned back on when he reached across her to grab her wrist. It was her right wrist, and she stiffened when she saw the maglock. “ _No!_ ”

 

“Too bad,” he said, pinning her wrist to the wall. The wall she was resting against had to be metal for that to work, and she tried to punch at him with her left hand when he reached for it. He clamped his hand down on hers and twisted brutally, and she yelped when the gears in her wrist ground against each other. “Continue to fight me and your hands will be useless,” he warned, before closing another maglock around the wrist and pinning it. Her arms were held out, away from her body, and the position pressed her doorwings against the wall. There was no way to move them to ease the pressure, and she could already feel the chain beginning to cut through some of the sensors in the hinges. “Behave and I’ll let you keep your arms free.”

 

She bit at his hand when he settled it on her chin, but the fragger _laughed_ and lifted the edge of the cube to her lips. This time, he wasn’t as careful, and she struggled to keep from choking as the energon just kept pouring. When the cube was empty and her throat raw from suppressed coughs, he wiped away the energon that had dried at the corners of her lips. “To answer your question,” he said, rubbing his fingertips to deposit the dried energon in the empty cube, “yes, I’m considering it.” He leaned in to murmur the words directly against her audial receptor, “I’ve quite enjoyed the game.”

 

She froze, and he sat down next to her to drink his own cube. He was quiet and didn’t look at her, and she strained against the maglocks. It just dragged her doorwings against the wall, and she keened. At this rate, she would be suffering major sensory damage in her wings, the type of damage even the best medics couldn’t fix, and all of the best Praxian medics were on Cybertron.

 

“What are you gonna do to them?” she asked at last.

 

“Hm?”

 

“The humans. This is their planet before it’s yours.”

 

He shrugged. “Leave them alone for one of their generations, and they’ll kill themselves off.”

 

She narrowed her optics. “They’ve saved themselves from extinction before.”

 

He swallowed the last energon in his cube and looked at her. “I don’t mind helping them along.” His ears twitched, and he turned back to the door. He scooped up both empty cubes and left her, and she scraped her heels against the ground furiously.

 

“You won’t get away with that,” she yelled after him.

 

His only response was laughter.

 

The maglocks took their toll not long after, tingles stabbing into her fingers. Her left hand felt the worst, and the heat that had started in her wrist was spreading to her palm. It burned, and she wondered just how bad the injury was.

 

Every ventilation became an exercise in pain—breathe in and pressure was relieved off her back, but her wrists would twitch and there would be a flash of agony, and once she breathed out, the pressure returned to her back.

 

She was beyond critical thinking. All she could think of was the pain, and the more she thought about it, the more she panicked.

 

It took its’ toll, until her tanks seized and she curled over to empty her tanks on the floor. She continued heaving long after she’d emptied her tanks of any fuel from the past few days, and when she finally stopped, she was so exhausted that she fell into recharge.

 

\--

 

She onlined to the sensation of a damp cloth passing across her plating. “Unnn—what?” she whimpered, optics blearily focusing on Steeljaw.

 

“I’ve got some coolant. Poor grade, I’m sorry, but it will clean your mouth out.” He helped her wrap her hands around the small cube and lifted it to her mouth, and he held her hands up as she drank it down. Once the cube was empty, he removed it and continued to clean her plating.

 

She reset her optics. “You’re...cleaning me.”

 

“I’m glad your optics are functional.”

 

She attempted to glare at him before she shuttered her optics. “Why?”

 

“Do I need a reason?”

 

“Yes.” She didn’t have the strength to summon the words, ‘ _You threatened to make me clean up spilled fuel with my glossa. Of_ course _you need a reason to clean me up after I purge my tanks.’_

 

“Purging is an unfortunate experience,” he said lightly. “Particularly in a confined space.”

 

“That’s your reason?”

 

“None other.”

 

“You’re lying.”

 

She felt the rumble of laughter from his chassis pressed against her arm. “You’ll never know.”

 

“I’m so tired,” she whispered, but she didn’t require more recharge. She just wanted to be home, with Bumblebee and watching Sideswipe snipe at Fixit with Grimlock playing with Russell. She didn’t want to be in this room anymore, and she didn’t want to be around Steeljaw. Not that she ever did.

 

His hand passed over her forehead and traced her chevron. She shuddered, her doorwings protesting the movement. So he had unclipped her hands but hadn’t bothered to unchain her doorwings. _Wonderful_. “So rest.”

 

She leaned away from the touch. “Let me go first.”

 

“That’s not how this works,” his voice sounded genuinely regretful, but she had no intention in watching him lie to her.

 

“It can. You can just let me go.”

 

He stroked her chevron again, and she made a low noise. _Please stop touching her_. “No, I can’t.”

 

“You can,” she begged. “You can just--.” He placed his hand over her mouth again, shushing her.

 

She subsided, her frame trembling slightly. He moved his hand to her shoulder, and she wondered what he wanted. Despite the violence, there had been nothing in his manner to indicate there was anything other than an interest in control. Yet...there are other ways to control people, and she flinched away from him.

 

“Shh, Strongarm. I won’t hurt you.”

 

“You _already have!_ ”

 

“Not hurt you in the way you’re thinking,” he clarified.

 

“Get your hands off me,” she demanded, dredging up the strength to online her optics and glare at him. The coolant appeared to have settled her tanks, which was a shame. She’d live with the pain of straining her doorwings if it meant she could purge all over him. “ _Now_.”

 

He lifted his hand off her shoulder carefully, but he was still looming over her and that did not make her feel safe. He continued to wipe off her plating, and it disturbed her that he’d been able to start without waking her.  “Why do you care?” she asked after the soft sounds were becoming too much.

 

His ear twitched, but he didn’t look up at her. “Cleaning yourself up is unpleasant.”

 

“You’ve already got me at your mercy.”

 

His chassis rumbled with approval, and she shuttered her optics. Don’t indulge whatever power game’s he engaging in, Strongarm. “I reacted badly,” he said after a long moment. “I went too far. You never push the subject past what they can stand unless you seek their offlining.”

 

She tried to move away from him, but his hand curled around her knee and held her in place. “I’m not a subject,” she hissed.

 

“You are. And I’m sure that your team is discussing me as though I were a subject, so it evens out.”

 

“You—you can’t just—that doesn’t justify it!”

 

Her plating had to be spotless, but he still kept wiping it down. “Why hasn’t Autobot High Command intervened here?”

 

“I—what?”

 

“There’s five of you against what will be thousands of us, when I find them. This could restart the war. Why hasn’t Autobot High Command intervened?”

 

“I don’t know,” she answered, attempting to edge away from him. His hand flexed on her knee and kept her in place. He was cleaning her side now, and she bit down on her glossa to keep from giggling. She was ticklish. “I don’t know the answer to that.”

 

“We could very easily kill you. There were so many times we could have. Surely you’ve thought about that.”

 

She had known, but she hadn’t wanted to think about it. Bumblebee didn’t talk about it, so she didn’t know how to bring it up. “You could kill me now.”

 

“No profit to it,” he said dismissively.

 

“And you could’ve killed me...before.”

 

“You were useful.”

 

 _Were?_ Oh Solus.

 

“You still are, but your worth isn’t based on you, it’s what your team thinks of you that makes you valuable.”

 

She should’ve expected that. Dread made her shoulders come up, and the chain tightened. Her fingers scraped across the ground in an effort not to make a sound, and Steeljaw ignored it. “Have you made contact at all with Autobot High Command?”

 

The knowledge slammed into her like one of Grimlock’s favorite maneuvers. _He doesn’t know we made contact with Jazz_. She wanted to laugh, suddenly. _He doesn’t know about Jazz!_ “No,” she mumbled, shuttering her optics. “No, we haven’t been able to re-establish contact with Cybertron.”

 

His hand tightened, those claws tugging on the cables leading to her knees. “Don’t lie to me.”

 

“I’m not! We haven’t established contact with Cybertron!” Technically, Jazz had established contact with _them_.

 

He relaxed his hold. “Good.”

 

 _He wants to keep the groundbridge from us for the same reason we want to keep it from him,_ she realized. _It’ll be easier to turn this planet into a Decepticon hideaway if we’re the only Autobots he has to fight_.

 

At some point, their fights would turn lethal if they weren’t able to contain Steeljaw and his crew. She shivered slightly at the thought, and determination wiggled slightly in her processor. They _would_ keep Steeljaw from finding the other stasis cells.

 

“I think I’m clean enough,” she managed.

 

“No, no, there’s more.”

 

“Stop,” she said.

 

He looked at her, and his optics were intent. “No.”

 

She pushed at his arms, using it to push herself away from him. He turned the grip around so that his hands were wound around her wrists, and she hissed when he squeezed her left wrist. He rose, using the grip as leverage to force her down, and she winced when her doors hit the ground. He pressed down until her doors were flat against the floor and the chain grinding into her hinges.

 

She hated being trapped, but he’d left himself an opening, and she took it. Her power had always been in her legs, anyway.

 

He hit the opposite wall with a satisfying thud, and he slid to the ground, his optics flaring oddly. Must’ve hit his head. Satisfaction warmed her circuits, and she smirked as she sat up and he stood. “Don’t touch me again,” she warned, pressing her pedes against the floor.

 

“You can’t stop me,” he pointed out. “You’re weak and getting weaker. In order to keep the energon flowing in your lines, you need to stimulate your plating, otherwise it will gather in your legs.”

 

“You put me like this!” She cleared her vocalizer, anger searing through her. “It’s your fault!”

 

“So I’m fixing it.”

 

“You could fix it even more--.”

 

“ _No_.” He was hesitating, and she wished she knew _why_. Was he regretting the kidnapping? Or was he calculating how much further to push her? She was already feeling weak—the purging had merely been one step further down the process already begun. Cybertronians adapted to stressful situations or died, and she would be forced to make that choice soon.

 

It might have been what Steeljaw was banking on.

 

She just hoped Bumblebee could rescue her before that happened.

 

“Drink this.”

 

She reared her head back from the small vial in front of her face, but he wrapped one hand around the back of her head and held her in place. She fought him, but his hand tightened slightly and she stopped fighting. His claws and potential open cerebral circuitry were not a mix she wanted. “It won’t hurt you,” he said softly.

 

She pressed her lips together.

 

He yanked her head back, and with the different angle, she could see the small ledge on the vial, and her optics widened before he forced that between her lip plating. She gagged when it touched her glossa, but he pulled her head back further, and she instinctively swallowed it.

 

He kept at it until the vial was empty, and then he stored it. He released her and she fell back against the wall, her hands flexing on the floor. Whatever was in the coolant went straight to her processor, and the room became tinted heavily with blues and greys. “What--?” she slurred. Her glossa didn’t seem to want to work.

 

“Follow my finger,” Steeljaw instructed, waving one of his claws in front of her optics. She narrowed her optics, and the claw blurred into two and three.

 

“Which one?”

 

She saw him smile, and then her processor decided the energy needed to power her optics was energy she didn’t need to spend. Her eyesight abruptly went dark, and she listed heavily to the side. He stabilized her, his hands curling over her shoulder and arm. She couldn’t flinch away from him, but she tried.

 

Keyword on ‘tried’: her reflexes were too slow. What was intended to be a flinch was more of a leaning away.

 

“Easy, easy.”

 

“Lemme go.”

 

“You’ll fall over.”

 

“So?”

 

“You’ll hurt yourself.”

 

“Noooooooooo.”

 

“Fine.” He removed his hands, and she started to list to the side again. Her doorwing was pinned between her and the wall, and she hissed, and he hauled her upright again. “Believe me?”

 

“What—did you dose?” Words wouldn’t form in her processor, and she couldn’t turn her optics back on. “Why?”

 

He was moving her right arm—stretching it out and folding it back in. It felt strange, and her left wrist felt almost swollen, as if Cybertronian plating could rise and fall like human skin. “What—you?”

 

“I don’t want you to crimp any lines.”

 

She sighed when he rotated her wrist. Her processor gave up the ghost and she stopped trying to form words, but when he picked up her left wrist she yelped and tried to pull away from him. He stopped her to examine her wrist, and when the tips of his claws pricked her wrist cabling, she panicked and listed away from him, her doorwings twitching. “Nononononononono,” she panted, anxiety rising in her chassis.

 

“Shhh.” He rotated her wrist and she screamed, the gears grinding against her cables. He stilled, wrapping his fingers around her arm. She tried to pull away from him, but his grip was too strong.

 

Her perception was wavering too; she could feel his fingers on her arm and his other hand on her shoulder, but the rest of her sensory readings were either too sensitive or too dull to feel anything else. She couldn’t feel his field, and hers’ was spiking all over the place.

 

“Tell me something.”

 

“Ehm?”

 

She felt him shift and start to stretch out her leg. Her spark was whirling fast, but her mind was detached. She didn’t remember where she was—she was home, right? One of their first missions on Earth had resulted in her getting all mixed up and under Fixit’s direction, Bumblebee had helped uncramp her lines.

 

Yes, the same thing had to have happened again, she decided.

 

“Strongarm. You’re not listening.”

 

“Sorry,” she said automatically. “Sir.”

 

There was a small chuckle. “Strongarm, why didn’t you tell your Lieutenant the full details of your interaction with me—I mean, Steeljaw?”

 

She hunched down, shame curdling her tanks. The words gathered on the end of her glossa, but she was struggling with getting them out. She must’ve hurt herself worse than she’d thought. “Wanted—to stay.” She sighed irritably. Her spark was whirling even faster, and her spark casing felt too hot, and she wondered why that was. “Working in the field. Sir.”

 

There was a ‘hmph’ and then he patted her helm. She froze—Bumblebee wasn’t usually one for casual touches, so maybe if she didn’t move he’d stop. “Get some rest, Cadet.”

 

“Yes sir,” she said automatically. Usually she offlined her optics to initiate recharge, but her optics were already offline, so she powered down and did her best to ignore how her spark was pulsing.

 

It wasn’t easy, but she finally managed.

 

\--

 

She woke up some time later, her processor aching. Her doorwings were in pain, but it was muted somehow. There was a strange sensation at the back of her glossa, like the time she had tried high-grade with her cadet class and woke up after being overcharged.

 

Drugged...she had been drugged. That vial of coolant must have been laced with something. Why had he drugged her? She had no memories after he’d forced it down her throat, and she quivered, the chains clinking quietly. She couldn’t trust how she felt—she already felt detached from the pain in her doorwings. Had there been anything else, she might not be aware of it until after she was out of there.

 

The room was constantly dark, but from where the doors closed, it looked even darker, so she guessed it be night. Her chronometer’s continued malfunction had messed up her sense of time, so while she knew it was passing, she couldn’t tell the difference between night and day.

 

First thing on her list, she told herself with grim humor, was to set up a back up for her chronometer so that wouldn’t happen again.

 

It was strange to be awake without Steeljaw looming over her, and she appreciated the space. It gave her some time to herself, and she forced herself to move to her knees and then her pedes. She had to bow backward a little to keep the pressure off her doorwings, and her ankles shook. She caught herself on the wall—didn’t want to call Steeljaw by the noise—and her pedes hurt with the pressure. Still, she needed to stand and get the energon flowing.

 

The drug slowed her reaction time. Her systems must have processed most of it, but the aftereffects were still present. She needed to move, urge her systems to catalyze it faster.

 

She wondered if she could take off the chains. She reached behind her back to see if she could reach the locks, but they were placed on the inside of the hinges, away from where she could reach. She tried anyway, and her fingers jammed against the chain. She groaned, the sensory overload sending her to her knees. She shifted back to a sitting position and swept a hand across her lower back.

 

She stared at the energon on her hand. She wasn’t fully sure what she expected, but the sight of her energon staining her hand hit her hard.

 

“You get used to it.”

 

She flinched _hard_ at Steeljaw’s voice in the doorway. How did he know she was awake? Was he monitoring her remotely? “The sight of energon on your hands. You get used to it.” He stopped out of kicking range, his mouth pursed. “Of course, you keep moving, so you’ve done the damage to yourself.”

 

“I wouldn’t even _be_ in this position if you hadn’t kidnapped me,” she snapped, badly wishing for a weapon. “You _drugged_ me.”

 

He shrugged, taking an energon cube out of subspace. “Yes.”

 

“For what purpose?!”

 

“You were not harmed,” he told her.

 

“The act of drugging is an act of harm! According to Autobot Regulations--.”

 

He sighed and placed a hand over her mouth, and she bit down on his fingers. She was so tired of him silencing her, and he growled at her. She narrowed her optics and bit down harder. Energon flooded her mouth and it sickened her, but she wouldn’t let go of him.

 

He wound his claws into the wires at her elbow and yanked, and she opened her mouth in a silent scream. He pulled his hand out of her mouth and she spat out the energon on the ground. His hand flexed in her elbow, and this time she did scream, the pain bouncing across multiple sensors and the pain looped briefly before her internal systems forced some of her nonessential systems to shut down in an effort to prevent it from becoming a feedback loop.

 

She slumped forward, sparks playing out from under her plating. Steeljaw removed his claws from her elbow joint, his claws scorched, and she smirked slightly before allowing her optics to dim. “Your fault,” she rasped. Her vocalizer wanted to click off, but whatever Steeljaw had done was preventing it.

 

He scowled at her, and then his ears flicked up and back and he smirked slightly. “I guess I know what your limits are now.”

 

“You’re horrible,” she whispered.

 

“Perhaps.”

 

The nonessential systems, like her defenses and the parts of her processor that analyzed action in real time, weren’t coming back on. They would only come back online after a reboot, but she didn’t want to reboot while Steeljaw was in the room. It would be vulnerable, and she didn’t want to give him access to her systems while her firewalls were down.

 

“You need to fuel. You’ve purged what you had, you need to eat.” He opened the cube, the twitching making the cube slosh slightly.

 

“I don’t want any fuel from you,” she rasped. “You’ll drug it again.”

 

He growled at her, before he took a careless swig of the cube. “There. Trust it?”

 

“No.”

 

“Impossible, little--,” he cut himself off. “...please?”

 

She stared, before she relented. “Fine. Am I allowed to drink it myself?”

 

“Your hands are still shaking,” he observed.

 

She glanced pointedly at how the cube was sloshing. “So are yours.”

 

“Together, then.”

 

She rolled her optics, but she didn’t have much of a choice. She gestured for the cube, and he carefully let it rest in her hands. He helped lift it to her mouth, but his hands stayed on hers. There was no pulling her head back or holding her chin in place. After she’d finished the cube, he subspaced the empty cube and lingered. She wanted him to be away from her, and her spark was whirling fast again. “Waiting for the drug to kick in?” she asked, her voice pitching higher on the last word.

 

“I told you, there’s no drug in that one.”

 

“In _that_ one.” She leaned away from him. He was always close enough for her to feel his field, and it rippled with strange emotions she couldn’t be a name to. “Could you give me some Solus-blessed _space?_ ”

 

His optics were intent, and discomfort crawled over her plating. “Why do you hate being touched? Did something happen to you?”

 

Rage replaced discomfort. “No! Nothing _happened_ to me, and smelt you to the Pit that you think something has to happen to me for me to hate being touched by the person who kidnapped, chained, and drugged me!”

 

“When you thought I was Bumblebee, you still flinched away from me.”

 

“I must’ve sensed it was still you. You can fool the processor but not the instincts.”

 

“I don’t think so. You were comfortable speaking to me, but you couldn’t stand to be touched.”

 

“I don’t like to be touched,” she snapped. “It doesn’t matter why.”

 

“It does. Everything matters.”

 

“It doesn’t matter why _to you_.” Besides, there wasn’t a reason. She just didn’t want someone to touch her. If someone touched her without her consent, she felt...itchy. If _she_ touched _them_...that was a different story.

 

Why did people have to assume that liking touch was the natural state and that _dis_ liking touch was wrong? Or that there had to be a cause?

 

“Frag you,” she exhaled. “I’m not broken.” Her plating was hot and pulled tight, and she wasn’t getting enough air. Apparently her emotional control was linked to her defenses, but she couldn’t connect why that was.

 

He wrapped his hands around her wrists, but his claws stayed clear of her wiring. “You need to breathe.”

 

“I’m fine,” she said, but it felt like her chest plating was constricting.

 

“You should reboot.”

 

“You’ll hack me.”

 

“No, I won’t. There’s nothing in your processor I want.”

 

“You’ve already hacked me.”

 

He shrugged. “Reboot.”

 

“No.”

 

“Cadet, your stubbornness is only going to make yourself feel worse.”

 

She opened her mouth to take in air. Her vents weren’t opening, and her body was too hot. “Cadet, reboot _now_.” She had been trained to drop everything and obey when a command was given in that tone, no matter who was giving the order, and she was obeying before she thought twice.

 

Her systems shut down fast, but it took twice as long for her systems to cycle up. Her vents all opened at once, dumping excessive heat fast. She gasped, optics flaring oddly. The colors shifted, and that was her least favorite thing about forced reboots. Her optics never balanced out until after her other systems finished booting up, so she could flicker through night vision to infrared to red-saturated in a klik.

 

It was just easier to turn off her optics until her systems were done powering up. She had to rely on her field to know where he was, and she was surprised to note that he was across the room.

 

So he had been serious about not hacking her.

 

He was pacing across the length of the room, and her audial receptors turned on. He was muttering to hims—no, he had to be speaking to someone in a comm. unit; there were breaks in his conversation and he was clearly listening to someone.

 

She didn’t hear any of it, just the indistinct sound of a quiet conversation across a large room. She strained her audials, but nothing was discernable.

 

Her systems were finally all powered on, and she turned her optics back on. Steeljaw’s back was to her, so she couldn’t read his face, but his tail kept twitching. To her, it seemed like a nervous gesture, but she couldn’t be sure. Perhaps agitation? His voice was perfectly even, but she’d seen him switch from that even tone to violence and back again, so his clarity of speech and control could be an affectation to conceal the violence, but the violence could also be an affectation and the control was the true response.

 

Or maybe a combination of the two. He seemed like the type to have a baseline, but adjust the baseline depending on whom he was speaking to or dealing with. The sudden violence worked to control her, but with his crew of Decepticons, where violence was expected? Perhaps the control was more strongly cherished there.

 

She reached up to rub her temples carefully. The receptors in her back and her doorwings had turned off in the reboot, but she still wanted to be careful. She was not a huge study in behavior, all of her Academy training had been focused on working in the field as a regular cop, not to specialize. Her conjectures wouldn’t be valued by an _actual_ specialist, so she would just need to observe as much as possible and keep the details as fresh as she could.

 

“You’ll want to get some rest.”

 

“Are you telling me what I want now?” she asked tiredly.

 

Steeljaw’s mouth tightened, but he didn’t otherwise react. “Tomorrow, if your team gives me what I want, you’re going back to them.”

 

“Oh thank Solus.”

 

“ _Only_ if they give me what I want,” he warned, and—was his tone _playful?_ “If they don’t, well, I guess I get to keep you.”

 

“Don’t count on it,” she hissed.

 

“Perhaps I should be telling _you_ that.” His optics lit on her chestplate, and she wanted to cover herself. “No one trades a groundbridge for a cadet. Maybe I’ll make you scrub that brand off yourself.”

 

She placed a hand over her Autobrand, anger making her straighten. Her HUD pinged about warnings about her doorwings, but she ignored them. “I’d like to see you _try_.”

 

His optics darkened. “Don’t tempt me.”

 

They froze like that, until Steeljaw’s tail twitched. He turned away from her, one hand going up to his ear, and he vanished out of the room, the door slamming with particular finality.

 

What _if_ Bumblebee refused to trade the groundbridge for her? Could she really stand being under Steeljaw’s thumb?

 

No, she reminded herself. Bumblebee won’t desert you. He won’t let Steeljaw keep you, he’ll rescue you.

 

She had to trust Bumblebee. If she couldn’t trust Bee, she couldn’t trust anyone.

 

\--

 

When he came back the following morning—it had to be morning, there was the slightest glimmer of light under the doorframe—he held a cube idly. She still didn’t trust him, but she let him feed her without a fight. She wanted to go home, and the less angry he was, the sooner they could leave.

 

She realized that had been a mistake as soon as the energon cleared her intake.

 

Her world went wobbly as soon as the energon hit her tanks, and she leaned forward as he unchained her from the wall. The chains stayed locked up around her wings, but the spare bit of chain looped between the two locked, and he used that to nudge her upwards. She couldn’t stand up straight, and he wrapped a hand around her arm to help her. “You—lying son of a--.”

 

“Sh,” he tsked. “I never promised this cube was clean. Now, just for safety purposes, I need to—ah, there we are.” He fiddled at the side of her helm and her optics went dark, and no matter what she tried to do, she couldn’t focus enough to undo it. “Can’t have you knowing where my safehouse is, after all,” he said, almost gleefully. He pulled at her arms until they were behind her back and he cuffed them with the stasis cuffs— _damn it_ , she might have been able to fight back until then.

 

“Why? You might—take me back?”

 

“Indeed.” His field was pulled tight to himself, but she was close enough to feel the undercurrent of amusement and anticipation. He really thought he’d be allowed to walk away with her.

 

She stumbled and he caught her, and his field flared with restrained amusement and excitement. He didn’t let her go after that, but she could sense how the loop of chain was around his wrist. If he pulled hard enough, he could dislocate both of her doorwings, but even one tug would be enough to override her disabled pain receptors.

 

He wanted only good behavior.

 

Whatever he’d dosed her with this time had kept her mind fairly clear, but her body was slow in responding. So...he wanted her to be aware but as close to unresponsive as possible. That was...not a good sign.

 

“Bee won’t—let you—keep.” She cursed her glossa and him for good measure, but he merely chuckled.

 

“If he doesn’t have what I want, he won’t have a choice. I chose the drop site for a singular purpose.”

 

She had no idea how to respond, so she fell silent. They walked for what felt like hours, and after two days of not being on her pedes, she started to limp not long after they’d begun. He shifted his hold on her arm to her waist, the chain on his hand and wrist making a scraping noise against her hip plating. She pushed at him weakly, but he ignored her.

 

She was beginning to wonder where they’d be stopping and why he wasn’t taunting her when they did come to an abrupt stop, and he shoved her to her knees. In doing so, the chain yanked and then held on her doorwings, and she whimpered as the pain receptors turned back on with full force. She dropped her head, hoping that lubricant wasn’t pouring from her optics. What an _embarrassment_.

 

“Here’s your cadet. I see you don’t have my groundbridge.”

 

“Strongarm, can you look at me? Look up,” Bee, oh _Solus_ , that was Bee’s voice, and he was close, and she was so close to being freed from this nightmare. She lifted her head, but her optics were still off, but she swiveled her head to get a better bead on his location with her audial receptors and her field.

 

 _There_ —far out of grabbing range, but his field was warm and solid, and she could _read him_ and _understand_ and she was definitely beginning to cry.

 

The small whimpers turned into a shriek when Steeljaw yanked on the chain. “Autobot, I lose patience. The groundbridge.”

 

“It isn’t stable enough to transfer,” Bumblebee’s voice was controlled, not—angry or afraid, just even and explanatory. “Given at least one of your team’s technical expertise, you should be aware of the dangers of transporting an unstable piece of spacetime technology.”

 

Steeljaw’s field was twisting with anger, but there was a sick pleasure at the bottom of it. _He thinks he’s going to keep me, oh Solus_ no. “So you just showed up and hoped for the best? Tsk, tsk, Lieutenant, your cadet must not matter to you.”

 

“That is _not_ the case,” Bumblebee’s voice broke in the middle, and his field flared with anxiety, but he kept his temper. “I brought you the schematics. With your team, you can build your own. I’m assuming that’s what kept you from another attempt at the spacebridge—that Thunderhoof’s expertise and remembrance just isn’t enough.”

 

“The schematics aren’t worth your cadet,” Steeljaw snarled.

 

“Take the schematics and leave her, or you’ll be walking away with neither. Your choice, Steeljaw.”

 

Steeljaw started to snarl, but there was a small hiss of searing metal and suddenly the pressure lightened on the hinges of her doorwings. The chain was still there, but Steeljaw wasn’t connected to it anymore. His field turned over in confusion, and Bumblebee cleared his vocalizer. “That was a warning shot,” he said conversationally. “Go for Strongarm’s throat and you’ll be dead before you hit the ground, trust me.”

 

Steeljaw took a step back, and Strongarm prayed.

 

She could wonder who Bumblebee had called for help later, when there wasn’t a chance Steeljaw would lunge for her.

 

Steeljaw’s logic prevailed, and he took two more steps away from her. “You’ll regret this,” he told Bumblebee, and Strongarm noted how his voice wavered slightly. For all of his logic and planning, this had not been an outcome he’d foreseen.

 

 _Good_.

 

“Probably.” There were the sounds of Bumblebee getting closer, and Steeljaw hesitated before the sounds of a transformation rocked her audial receptors. “Don’t follow!” Bee yelled to whoever was with him. “She’s the important one right now.” He knelt down next to her, fingers curling around her face and down her neck. “Damn, Strongarm, you look like you’ve been to the Pit and back.”

 

She laughed. “I think I have, sir. Can you—can you get the chains off? Please?”

 

“’Course.” He kept one hand on her shoulder as he moved around her, and she was grateful for it; she didn’t want to be sneaked up upon anytime soon. “Scrap—good thing we’ve got a medic waiting for you. You’re going to need it.”

 

“That b-bad?”

 

“Yeah. Hold on, I’m about to undo this and it’s gonna hurt, so yell as loud as you need to.”

 

“I don’t think that will--,” she cut herself off with a scream, and she lunged forward to avoid the stress on her doorwings. Bumblebee braced her with a hand on her shoulder, and she was dimly aware of him murmuring soothing nonsense.

 

She finally cut herself off when the last link was removed, and Bumblebee began to fumble with the stasis cuffs. “Sorry, sir,” she rasped.

 

“Only to be expected,” he said. “Prowl? You gonna come over?”

 

She wanted to stiffen, but she couldn’t. “Sir!”

 

“At ease, cadet,” she’d never heard Prowl’s voice in person before, and she noted how crisp it sounded. “You’ll need to be debriefed extensively, but that can wait until after medical treatment. Are there any immediate injuries that our medic should be aware of?”

 

“Just my doorwings, sir,” she stammered as Bumblebee got the stasis cuffs off. Her left wrist hurt, and she rubbed it. “And my wrist.”

 

“Have you been hacked?”

 

“I b-believe so. At least, Steeljaw informed me that he hacked me shortly after taking me captive.”

 

“Not since?”

 

“Not that I’m aware of.”

 

Bumblebee’s hands were moving over her helm and then her optics were back on, and she reset them in the sudden sunlight. “And were you drugged?” Prowl was crouching over her, and she flinched back instinctively. His optic ridges rose, and he backed up a few paces, but he remained in a crouch. She appreciated that he was on optic-level with her, but she needed to see Bumblebee to _truly_ know she was all right.

 

“Yes sir, twice. He drugged me before we left for here, but it was a drug that limited my frame’s mobility instead of hindering my processor.”

 

“He didn’t want you fighting him,” Prowl murmured. “And now?”

 

“I believe my systems have catalyzed it.”

 

“Pain will do that.” Prowl stood up. He looked exactly like he did in the training vids from the Academy, but his plating was dull and there was grime streaked across his plating. He must have been the one to shoot the chain, then—that was standard with the prone shooting position on Earth. “I’ll go tell Ratchet to come over, I do not believe she is capable of walking the distance.”

 

“ _Ratchet?_ ” Her voice was a squeak, and Bumblebee squeezed her shoulders.

 

“What, you think we weren’t gonna make sure you didn’t get the best?”

 

“Fixit is accomplished, certainly, but he does not have the necessary background in treating Praxians,” Prowl said dispassionately. “Excuse me.” He wandered off, and Bumblebee moved in front of her.

 

“Hey, you really scared--,” he almost squeaked when she wrapped her arms around his neck, but he reciprocated the desperate hug quickly enough, his arms underneath her doorwings. She clung to him, her frame shuddering with the repressed terror and anxiety that she’d attempted to keep away for the past few days. “Shh, it’s okay, I’ve got you, you’re safe now.”

 

“I’m sorry,” she gasped, “I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry, I’m sorry--.”

 

“Hey, you’ve got nothing to be sorry about,” Bumblebee said forcefully. He cradled her like she was apt to break apart if he didn’t hold her together, and she’d never been more grateful for his concern. “We’ll talk this over, but listen to me—this was _not your fault_. Do you understand?”

 

She hiccupped slightly and buried her face against his neck. “I should’ve fought harder, I should’ve--.”

 

“Do not blame yourself,” Bumblebee persisted as he stood. She was only slightly smaller than him, and heavier than him, but he was holding her up with barely any strain. She didn’t want to move, and he was apparently content to keep hold of her. “I mean it.”

 

She shut off her vocalizer, but it didn’t stop the guilt.

 

Ratchet met them halfway in altmode, and Bumblebee draped her against the medberth. She clutched at him, but he shook his head. “Not enough room for both of us, and Ratchet’s safe. Trust me, okay? I’ll be just outside the entire time.”

 

“The sooner we get you back, the better it is,” Ratchet said gently.

 

She didn’t like it, but she knew to obey medical officers without question, and she _would_ feel better once she was back home. “Okay,” she mumbled. “I trust you.”

 

Bumblebee’s grin was wide and comforting, and he squeezed her knee before backing out. The doors closed, and she tried hard not to feel trapped. The room she’d been kept in had been huge, there was no reason for her to link the small interior of Ratchet’s altmode to her captivity.

 

“Breathe,” Ratchet instructed. “Breathe in for four, hold for four, exhale for four. Are you with me?”

 

“Breathe in for four,” Strongarm did as instructed, and while her spark didn’t stop whirling in her chest, her plating relaxed and her vents opened all the way. Ratchet counted for her all the way back, and by the time he was pulling into the junkyard, she felt almost normal.

 

Bumblebee appeared at the doors and he helped her out. Grimlock and Sideswipe were waiting off to the side, and Sideswipe looked...almost frightened. Grimlock just looked ecstatic to see her, but Bumblebee held up a hand. “Give us some space, okay Grimlock?”

 

“Maybe later,” she told Grimlock with a wan smile. Grimlock’s hugs were legendary, and maybe in a bit, after her doorwings were fixed...and a little time.

 

Grimlock brightened even more, and behind Sideswipe, Fixit rolled up. “Cadet Strongarm, how good to see that you’re all bright-night- _right_.”

 

“Good to see you too, Fixit.”

 

Ratchet appeared on her other side and he slipped an arm under her wings. “We’ve set up an operating suite within the remains of the _Alchemor_ , and I want to set up a fuel line. You’ve been underfueled for at least a few days, and I don’t feel comfortable operating until your fuel levels are back up.”

 

“She’s gonna need surgery?” Sideswipe’s voice went high, and Ratchet glanced at him.

 

“Some.”

 

“O-oh.”

 

“I’ll be okay,” she said awkwardly. “I think.”

 

They got her up and into the _Alchemor_ , and she sat down on the edge of the medberth and offered her arm for the fuel line. Ratchet cleaned the area—she wondered how much grime had compacted in her seams and she made a note to wash as soon as medically advisable—and then he patched the line into her internals. The rush of energon made her stiffen and then relax, and she shuttered her optics. “You scanned me the entire ride, didn’t you?”

 

Ratchet snorted. “You didn’t feel it?”

 

“My sensory suite has been unreliable,” she admitted. “I can feel fields but nothing else right now.”

 

“I’ll check for that, then.” Ratchet took a scanner out of his subspace, and across from her, Bumblebee leaned against the console. He watched as Ratchet moved around her, and her wrist twinged.

 

“Is something wrong, sir?” She shifted when Ratchet gestured at her, and Bumblebee’s mouth quirked.

 

“You’re asking _me_ that?”

 

She ducked her head to hide her slight smile. “Fair enough.”

 

There was a blared horn, and she jumped, and Ratchet snarled. “Shut _up_ , Jazz!”

 

“Jazz is here?” she asked, looking up.

 

“I had his comm. number, and since we weren’t able to make contact with Cybertron, we made contact with him. He’s the one who made sure we called in the cavalry.”

 

“It’s been a long time since I’ve been considered the cavalry,” Ratchet observed.

 

“I am grateful nonetheless,” Strongarm told him, and Ratchet’s eyes softened.

 

Jazz swung up the ramp to perch next to Bumblebee. Prowl followed behind him at a far more sedate pace with a datapad, but his optics were on her. She straightened, and her doorwings complained. He held up a hand. “At ease, Cadet. You have no need to stand on ceremony.”

 

“Yes, sir.”

 

“Ratchet, what are the extent of her injuries?”

 

Ratchet sighed. “I haven’t analyzed her code yet, so just keep that in mind. The wiring connecting her doorwings is severely damaged but fixable. Her left wrist has congealed energon in the gears of her joint, which has inflamed the cabling and swollen the protoform, I’m guessing from cuts to her cabling and then the application of stasis cuffs that it cut off her self-repair. Added to that, she is significantly under-fueled and there is some slight scarring of her tanks from purging. All of it is repairable, but she’ll need some physical therapy for her wrist and her doorwings.”

 

“I’m certain we can come up with a plan,” Bumblebee said casually.

 

“I’m still here,” she said, a little nervously. While it was comforting to know her injuries weren’t dire, she didn’t like being talked about as though she wasn’t present.

 

“Of course.” Prowl was taking notes, his optics focused, and she wondered that if she paid close enough attention if she would see the script reflected in the glass of his optics.

 

She decided not to push it.

 

Ratchet placed a hand on her shoulder, and she looked up at him. “I’m going to give you a mild sedative,” he told her. “It won’t do anything except slow your processor enough for you to get some rest, and it will prevent memory loops in recharge. We’ll let you fuel up while you recharge, and then I’ll operate while you’re offline. It’s going to hurt; you won’t want to be online for that.”

 

“It’s true,” Prowl confirmed.

 

“Can I watch you put the sedative in?”

 

“It’s going to go in your energon drip, but yes, you may.” Ratchet didn’t treat her question as odd, and she was grateful. Maybe it wasn’t the first time he’d gotten that sort of question, either.

 

She watched him as he inserted the syringe full of purple sedative into her energon, turning it vaguely more violet, and then she sighed. “I’m guessing that by the time I wake up, you’ll have repaired my doorwings?”

 

“Yes.” Ratchet eased her down onto the berth on her chassis with her wings up. “Sleep well, Cadet.”

 

The murmuring between Jazz, Prowl, and Bumblebee became more indistinct. “Yes, sir.”

 

\--

 

She woke up to cool darkness, her left arm strapped down. Her wrist felt oddly weightless, but she could move her right hand. She started to roll up, but there was a hand on her shoulder, and she turned her head to look up at Jazz. “Easy, easy,” he soothed, dragging a chair over and sitting next to her. He offered her a small cube with a straw. “Just coolant, to clear your intake. You’re gonna be on a drip for the next couple of days.”

 

She sipped through the straw, assessing him through dim optics. “Where’s Bumblebee?”

 

“Resting. Kid hardly rested while you were gone. Prowl was _this_ close to drugging him to making sure he got some recharge.”

 

She flinched. “That’s not funny.”

 

Jazz’s optics flickered. “Sorry. Either way, he needs the recharge. He watched Ratch operate on you.”

 

“Are you here to debrief me?”

 

“Just to make sure your processor’s functioning.”

 

Fear clutched her fuel pump. “How bad did he hack me?”

 

“Shhhh,” Jazz told her, placing his hand on hers. “Easy, you’re okay. So, let’s start with the foundation, all right? You got a faint Decepticon signal in the direction of Mt. Rainer, so Bumblebee sent you alone...”

 

“I—yes. Lieutenant Bumblebee’s been sending me on solo missions infrequently, to build up my experience when risk is limited. A number of the stasis cells on the _Alechemor_ were empty, so while they have a beacon, it is not as strong as the cells with Decepticons.”

 

“Smart. Has it helped you?”

 

“It’s helped me learn the territory and that has been helpful.”

 

“So, you’re driving back in the dark and the rain, and then what?”

 

Slowly, she walked through the entire story with Jazz, and the sky began to turn the bright orange of sunrise. Still, she wasn’t done, and Jazz listened.

 

To his credit, he didn’t react in any way—he didn’t gasp or try to interrupt her, he just kept his hand on hers’ and listened, and she was grateful for that. Bumblebee would have interrupted, or, or gasped, and she wasn’t sure she had the strength to repeat this story more than once.

 

Finally, she wound down, and he squeezed her hand. “You’ve been through a hell of a lot.”

 

“You can say that to me? With what you’ve survived?”

 

He waved a finger in front of her optics. “Don’t do that. Trauma isn’t relative. Yours isn’t diminished because I went through different things. You’ve been through a hell of a lot, and you kept your head. Those observations will help.”

 

“I’m not trained for that kind of thing,” she whispered.

 

“Wouldn’t surprise me if Prowl made sure you got it. He’s impressed, and trust me, he doesn’t impress easy.”

 

“It helped to keep my head in there.” She shifted. “It meant I wasn’t focusing on how scared I was.”

 

Jazz squeezed her hand again. “You thought past the instinctive fear. That’s good.”

 

“How badly did he hack me?” Her processor was leaping past the debrief, on why it was _Jazz_ —he had no personal connection to her, he had the relationship with Sideswipe and Bumblebee—doing the debrief. “Am I a walking bomb?”

 

“No, of course not.”

 

“Then why are you the one doing the debriefing?”

 

“Simple—Bee’s too close to you to be objective enough, and you’re too intimidated of Prowl to be as honest as you need to be. Standard operating procedure in cases like this, especially when it’s one of our own.”

 

“And how often is ‘cases like this’?”

 

“Too often,” Jazz leaned back in his chair and looked her over.

 

“You didn’t technically answer my question,” she said quietly.

 

“About?”

 

“How badly I was hacked.”

 

Jazz’s optics turned assessing, and he let go of her. “We can’t find evidence you were hacked.”

 

“W-what?” Her intake was suddenly rust-dry, and her spark started to pulse.

 

“Ratchet’s gone over every line of your code, and he’s found no insertions, no deletions, or replacements.”

 

“Then w-why would he say he hacked me?”

 

“You said he did wetworks, right?”

 

“Yes, he was proud of it.”

 

“Part of his psychological power games. To be good— _really_ good, enough to be proud—there has to be a certain mastery of psychology. You saw some of it, we call it ‘profiling’ in the business. So I’m thinking...he might have told you that he hacked you for a singular purpose. He needed you to believe that he had control over you, and he tested you to see if you’d believe him. When you did, that was all he needed.”

 

“And if I didn’t believe him?”

 

“Pro’ly would’ve hacked you for real.”

 

She mulled that over. “That’s actually...somewhat comforting.”

 

“It’s gonna take you a few days of physical therapy before Ratchet wants you back on light duty. Prowl thinks you should take some time, get some therapy to come to terms with what’s happened, before you come back.” Jazz tilted his head. “What do you think?”

 

“Regulations state that after a traumatic event that Elite Guardbots are required to take a certain amount of time off from active duty.”

 

“Yeah, ‘cept here’s the thing, sweetspark. This isn’t technically an assignment that you’ve been given, but with how the Council works, if you went back to Cybetron to get treatment from PsyOps, you’d never be let back on Earth.” Jazz held up his hands. “Your choice, but I need you to make it with both optics on.”

 

“W-what’s going on with the Council?”

 

“You know the majority of them are made up of ‘bots who did not live out the war as either faction.”

 

“Yes, they were neutral.”

 

“And they don’t think much of the survivors.”

 

“I...am aware that the experience required to advance through ranks has been unfairly skewed against the veteran Autobots.” She cleared her vocalizer. “Case in point, Lieutenant Bumblebee.”

 

“Yeah, he’s gifted, you’ve noticed. Why do you think that?”

 

“I haven’t thought about it.”

 

“You’re many things, Cadet, but a good liar is not one of them.”

 

“It’s the Council, they have control over the Elite Guard and how law is made.” She wanted to move away from Jazz’s optics, but she was strapped down to the berth. Her doorwings twitched minutely.

 

“Prowl’s willing to vouch for you,” Jazz said seriously. “So I’m going to ask again: why do you think that is?”

 

“I don’t think they like the war continuing to affect current politics.”

 

“If that’s the case, then why does current legislation brand Decepticons as criminals on sight?”

 

“B-because they are!”

 

“I think you know better than that. You’re a lot like some of our best ‘bots, Cadet. You’re structured, you’re thorough, you think well on your feet, you keep your head in stressful situations. Most of that has to be taught. You didn’t. But what I see missing is a lack of critical thinking—but not because you lack the capacity. It’s easier for you not to see it, because then your world gets monumentally less structured. So, it’s time for you to make a choice. We’re happy to get you what you need, whether here or Cybertron. But if you ask me? You’ll make a bigger difference here than on Cybertron.” Jazz stood up. “Ratchet’ll be in in a minute to check you over, see how the patches are integrating.”

 

She reset her optics. “You’re giving me time to decide?”

 

“You need to think it through. This is the kind of decision that’ll affect how you act and what choices you make, so you need to consider it from all the angles. Take all the time you need.”

 

“Yes, sir,” she said softly.

 

He winked at her before his visor flipped over his eyes, and she watched for Ratchet to come back. She had a lot of information to mull over.

 --

“You sure you should be standing up?” Sideswipe demanded.

 

Strongarm barely gave him any notice. “Ratchet’s cleared me, and I’ve been prone for too long.” She shifted from foot to foot, almost wanting to run—her spark was whirling again. Ratchet said the anxiety attacks were normal, she just needed to breathe and wait them out. “I need to be on my pedes again.”

 

“Still,” Sideswipe persisted.

 

“It’s okay to say you were worried about me,” she said, looking over at him. He was pouting, and she wondered why he was such a child all the time. No—even _Russell_ was better behaved than him.

 

“Me? Worried about you?” Sideswipe snorted, dropping his optics. “Er—maybe just a little. Just ‘cause of the previous instance with Steeljaw. You know.”

 

“Thanks,” she said dryly, irritation rippling through her. “At least you didn’t put a human in harm’s way this time.”

 

“Hey--!”

 

“That was ridiculously unsafe, and you put Russell in danger.”

 

“You might have noticed it saved you!”

 

“If you hadn’t left me in the first place, I might not have needed saving,” she snapped.

 

“Oh, we’re really going to do this now?” Sideswipe waved his arms agitatedly, and she whirled on her heel to meet his optics squarely. She was just a little taller than him, and she gladly used it now to loom over him. “After all this time?”

 

“That encounter made him _curious_ , and this is what the result was! And you can’t even come out and say that you were concerned, you have to vaguely state it because of what, your ego?” _Solus_ , she wanted to punch him in the face. She held onto the impulse—barely. “You’re weak.”

 

Sideswipe hissed. “Look, it’s only out of respect for your trauma that I won’t--.”

 

“Won’t what?” She wet her lip plating with her glossa, dark fury swirling through her. “You really think you could beat me?” She laughed, and rage fizzled off Sideswipe’s frame. “You and I both know that that isn’t true.”

 

“You--.”

 

“That’s _enough_ ,” Jazz was between the two of them, physically pushing them apart. For a moment, Strongarm wanted to take his arm and _break_ it, and then she realized what she wanted to do to a superior officer. The anger drained away and left behind fear and shame, and she dropped her optics. “Sideswipe, we’re gonna take a walk. Strongarm, go clear your processor.”

 

“Yes sir,” she whispered, and she fled, out of the junkyard to the surrounding trees. The wind whistled through the branches, and she dimly heard a night bird call. That was good—there had not been any animal calls when Steeljaw captured her.

 

Something was wrong, and she needed to learn what it was. It couldn’t just be trauma—it had to be something Steeljaw did to her. She didn’t get angry like that—he had to have hacked her. She needed to talk to Ratchet and maybe Bumblebee, they would both know.

 

She set her jaw. She _would_ get to the bottom of this.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this about--a month ago? Month and a half ago? It was during my Great Rewatch Project of Criminal Minds, that that element is definitely in play there. Also the Gothic memes--I was mostly inspired by those. There will be an accompanying piece, and then, goddess willing, I'll have some other pieces that will cover other episodes.


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